


Untamable Beast

by onenotseen



Category: Bleach
Genre: M/M, My First Oneshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-06
Updated: 2013-03-06
Packaged: 2017-12-04 11:19:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/710225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onenotseen/pseuds/onenotseen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kuchiki Byakuya reflects on the first time that Abarai Renji fought him with his bankai.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untamable Beast

_Wild._ A word that I must have never truly known the meaning of before I witnessed his display of anger and unrestrained contempt at my person. I could taste the crackling electricity on his sword when it struck my own, and I could smell the fear in his every breath.

I had convinced myself that he was just like any other subordinate, stumbling and sputtering out his words in my presence. But unlike any of those underlings, Abarai is still the only one who would dare directly defy my will.

Most shinigami are reduced to stuttering, kneeling fools when confronted by my full attention. Weaker ones can’t even move, let alone stand. But this red-haired, striped beast stands before me, looking straight in my eyes, and telling me that he will cut me down if he has to in order to save my sister. At the time, I pitied him. I felt that he was just like all of the others, just as weak, just as insignificant. But then, he stood up.

Stripes of blood flew languidly from each weeping incision made by my senbonzakura shards, and he cried out, not like a wounded creature, but with a likeness of an ancient tiger, full of raw power and determination, rejecting the idea of being as weak as to fall to his knees and submit. The words he told me were not to try and explain his true motives, but rather their purpose was to pacify my own inquiries and misunderstandings.

Unbidden, he charged at a wall of diamond, as delicate in appearance and hard in demeanor as I was then, and shattered his very blade upon my chest. It was then that I truly grasped at who my lieutenant is—not as a human, no—but as a young beast yet to earn the wisdom that time so leisurely gives. Where I thought he would have a limit to his progress, I discovered that like the ryoka boy, he was just as adaptable and instinctual when it came to fighting. And at that time, his fang did reach me.

His blood had smudged on the scarf that displayed my family’s status and wealth. Continuing to wear it seemed almost like a joke and an insult to the man who very nearly killed himself to do what he found to be just. But I was not ready for him, so I did all that I could in that moment and cast the scarf over his body—a white curtain blotted with crimson stains.

So on that night after Kurosaki Ichigo returned to his world, when Renji visited my family estate where I was resting from my injuries, I let him in to my personal room to say what he felt obligated to.

And perhaps it was like a loyal dog, running after his master. But based on the way his sharp eyes looked directly into mine despite his generous amount of bowing, and his distance from my futon, I would guess that he felt no submission in his actions.

That is why when I invited him closer, after he confessed to wanting me privy of the knowledge that he is grateful to work under my command, I couldn’t help but lean in to smell the dusty scent of his sweat that was increasing in sheen the longer he stayed in my presence.

Him tilting his face to brush his lips over my own was something that I left down to his inability to control his physical reactions to whatever heated emotion ran through his mind. And perhaps I left my own response and encouragement of these actions down to my own recent breach of protocol, and allowance of forgotten affection for the only family I have left to reach my heart.

Because my hand moved up to his liquidy red hair on its own, and my eyes could not help but stare at the black lines moving jaggedly down his chest when his kosode fell open on one side, he was encouraged to continue.

His warm hand found its way to my own unoccupied one, and snuck its fingers between my own, and all I could be reminded of was how this loud, coarse, whirlwind of a man could be briefly tamed. All it took was for me to see him be wild, and accept this nature as part of his worthiness to be acknowledged as my second-in-command. 

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at a oneshot. This is based on Renji and Byakuya's battle in the Soul Society arc, from Byakuya's perspective. So, this is kind of my dip into writing this fandom, their characters, and a oneshot.  
> I usually hate one-word prompts, but I saw one that said, 'Wild', and I thought of this.  
> 


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